Town Square

Social Services office stays open, for now

Original post made
on Aug 14, 2011

A new owner has other plans for a conveniently located downtown building housing a free health clinic and a county social services agency that serves the poor in North County. Losing the local site could send struggling residents to San Jose to obtain much-needed services.

I remember WAYYY back when that site was a storage area for Mintons Lumber. Putting up a Social Services building on that site was a good move that helped and still helps countless people. Destroying that resource to make a stack of tiny apartments only helps a few people... Namely, helping put money in developers pockets (and maybe a few other people...?).

The corner of very busy Moffett Blvd. and VERY, VERY busy Central Expressway is hardly a smart, suitable or safe location for cramming 128 new homes... and possibly as many children. And the traffic of all those "bread winners" coming and going, especially during commute hours will clog Moffett even worse than the sorry state it gets now, which will then result in more cars taking Sterling and the nearby cross-streets (Jackson St.& Central Ave.), increasing traffic in those residential areas too.

If the site HAS to change, then make it retail or something else of benefit to all town folk, if not all valley folk.

That's a silly place for housing. SURE people can make more money building homes there instead of stores, but let's use some common sense and consider the long term case. It's right next to downtown, so put something useful to ALL Mountain View residents there (no more restaurants please!). And don't change a thing at the current location until a suitable replacement site for the social Services offices is found with 1/4 mile of the current site. Telling the poor and/or unfortunate to "Hike it to San Jose" is inhumane and unacceptable.

Posted by robert
a resident of another community
on Jan 14, 2014 at 2:41 pm

money doesn't talk , it screams ..we are fast becoming a 3rd world nation where civility and compassion don't count as much as money for the greedy few. when capitalism trumps society and democracy , this is what you get . as a community we all lose . except the few . robert

Posted by Moffett Resident
a resident of Willowgate
on Jan 14, 2014 at 11:58 pm

@robert - Thanks for bringing back this article from 2011. Reading it again is instructive. Here's how has it turned out, 2 1/2 years later:

Social Services is gone. Fairfield Residential eventually bailed on the project. A different developer (Prometheus) has received approval to build not 128, but 184 units at this site, now known as the 100 Moffett project. The City Council closed part of a road and sold it to the developer. The new apartments will rent for up to $8,000/month for a 2-BR unit. Planning and City Council approved a plan with grossly inadequate parking, saving money for the developer and enabling them to build more densely. A prominent rationalization from Council, and from our new mayor, was that the "new generation" doesn't want to drive cars, and will ride bikes.

Steve's comments from 2011 are absolutely relevant today.

This November we will be voting for three new Council members, to replace three who will be termed out. We need to pay very, very close attention to who we elect.